


BROKEN AWKWARDNESS

by BrokePerception



Category: Bones (TV)
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-01
Updated: 2012-06-01
Packaged: 2017-11-06 12:24:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/418904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrokePerception/pseuds/BrokePerception
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set in the second season, after Aliens In The Space Ship. Episode format! Case file!</p>
            </blockquote>





	BROKEN AWKWARDNESS

BETA READ by _Lady Anemone_

* * *

She was still there under the sand, like she had never escaped, begging for air to breathe, and – suddenly sat upright with her eyes wide and her mouth open in a soundless scream.

Tempe gave in to the feeling of his strong arms around her trembling figure. The soft circles his hand made on her lower back gradually calmed her down. Her face was hidden in Booth's shoulder, and she soon forgot about the subject of her nightmare. The Gravedigger.

A soft moan escaped her lips as her partner coincidentally stroked the bare skin between the Tshirt and boxer shorts she was wearing. "What about Cam?" The female anthropologist suddenly asked, pulling back gently and dabbing her eyes with the back of her right hand, realizing he probably shouldn't be there. Her voice sounded hollow in the darkness of her own bedroom.

Booth's eyes wandered over her tear streaked face and made eye contact, before he sighed and realized she was absolutely right. She wasn't really feeling comfortable about the situation with Cam, so the reason behind the question was well founded. What was he still doing at her apartment? He wasn't supposed to be there, but this fact didn't stop him from moving over, lying by her side on the covers and holding her tight as she slept, chasing more bad dreams away. Bad dreams which followed her like a shadow, always lingering there with her. Smothering her, barely giving her air to breathe, but then again giving her just enough to keep her from death. Like the Gravedigger.

The rest of her night was filled with unconcerned dreams, like Booth's sleep was, until a beeping noise from the FBI agent's mobile phone pulled her out of them. His eyes blinked open after a second as well and released Tempe from the warm and safe spot in his muscled arms, as he propped himself up on one elbow and reached over her body for his cell phone, of which the screen glowed blue from its spot on the nightstand, where Booth had left it before joining Tempe onto the double bed that night.

"Booth."

*Is there any reason why Dr. Brennan is not picking up her cell phone?* As usual, Zach Addy sounded impatient, his words coming quickly. Booth's phone was on speaker, and Tempe heard something else lingering in her assistant's voice as well. Although she couldn't immediately place the emotion that sounded through his words, she decided it was anger.

Zach rarely became angry and she understood there must be something clinically significant going on if that couldn't wait until she arrived at the Jeffersonian. He usually considered becoming angry as useless and a waste of energy, so this emotion flowing through his words made it odd. That was the principal reason why it caught Tempe's attention.

She threw the covers off her body and crawled to the edge of the double bed, searching for her jacket and the pocket in which her cell phone was. As she pulled it out, she immediately noticed why Zach had been unable to call her, not to mention anyone else who might have tried. The little screen was empty, indicating the battery was off.

*I have been trying to call her.*

"I forgot to charge it last night," she whispered to Booth, before yelling, "I'm sorry, the battery ran out!" It was loud enough for her assistant to hear it on the other end and to think about the situation on the receiving side.

*Is Dr. Brennan with you?* Zach asked, curiosity and disbelief immediately taking over from the anger.

"Actually, I'm with her," the FBI agent mumbled, pushing his body upright with a fist and swinging his legs over the edge of the bed. "Are you going to tell me why you are sounding more like a rabbit that's had one too many cups of coffee or–"

*Some remains have been found at a squat at Second and Leicester."

"Zach, we are on our way," Tempe answered through the receiver of her partner's phone. Booth looked at her in that typical way, meaning 'Was this necessary?', as the man ended the conversation by closing his mobile phone and throwing it on the nightstand on his side. Why did she need two nightstands anyway?

"What?" Tempe asked, a frown creasing her forehead as her grayish blue eyes wandered over his face, trying to derive something from it; not knowing what that meant.

Booth's chocolate brown eyes glanced at the clock radio briefly, noticing that it was already nine o'clock and suddenly understanding why Zach had sounded so irritated...

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Tempe drove up the road and decreased the pressure her right foot applied to the throttle. Her left foot pushed in the clutch, while her right hand moved to the transmission and set it in the correct gear. She operated the turn signal as she steered the vehicle around a right turn, pulling back from the clutch, and pushing the throttle again as she left the turn behind her. Her pale eyes already perceived the commotion a little further down the alley. Her foot pulled back from the throttle again and she pushed in the clutch with her left and the brake with her right.

Tempe brought her vehicle to a screeching halt, put the transmission in neutral, shut down the engine with one movement of her right hand and pulled up the hand brake with a swift stroke before she undid her seat belt, opened the door of her Audi, climbed out of her dark green vehicle and shut the door behind her again.

The anthropologist moved to the back of the car to retrieve her bag before walking up to where her former assistant stood, almost bouncing up and down in excitement as usual. "I thought Agent Booth was with you this morning?" Zach asked, focused only on her as she crawled under the bright yellow evidence tape, holding the bag slung over her shoulder with her other hand.

And right at that moment, a black department Chevrolet came to a screeching halt behind the dark green Audi, everyone present looking up to watch Booth opening the car door, shutting it behind him and joining them outside the squat, freshly shaven and wearing a clean shirt. Tempe's eyes stayed on him a little longer than was really appropriate, before following the newly minted Dr. Addy into the building with the FBI agent in her wake. She still thought of him as her assistant, though. And he still behaved that way towards her, too. Zach rolled his eyes before entering the old apartment.

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Tempe squatted over the remains, putting down her beige French bag and opening the two metallic toned buckles to retrieve two medium blue latex gloves. Her grayish blue eyes wandered over the remains thoroughly before she concluded, "Two people, in mid-adolescence." She glimpsed at her partner before turning back to her remains. "Pubisses indicate a male and a female," Tempe concluded, right at the moment that the familiar sound of Booth's ring tone chimed and she instinctively turned her head up and in her partner's direction. She could usually perceive something of his expression, and her guesses about what that was all about were right most of the time.

"Alright," Booth said through the speaker part of his cell phone, removing it from his ear and closing it to glance at his partner briefly before putting the LG in the inside pocket of his jacket. When his eyes rested on Tempe again, she was still looking at him for an explanation of what the call had been about. He made a small movement with his head, subtly motioning for the way outside. "Come on, Bones. We've got another case. Chop-chop," Booth said, moving forward to slide his hands under her armpits and pull her upright.

Tempe was pulled upright by her partner in one swift movement, barely getting the chance to sling her bag back over her shoulder, before she was literally dragged from the crime scene. "Zach?"

"No worries, Dr. Brennan."

"And my–?" the female anthropologist called out, undoing her blue gloves and putting them in her right pocket on her way outside. Booth smiled at her a little too casually, before pulling her car keys from the near pocket of her dark overalls and throwing them behind him to land in Zach's hands in a straight line.

"Guys!" the youngest squint yelled from behind the pair. Tempe opened her mouth in protest, right on the moment Zach took her only argument from her mouth and yelled even harder, "I can't drive!"

Tempe looked helplessly at her partner for support, but only got another too warm smile. "The car will get back to the lab," was his only response. He and the anthropologist walked down the old, dusty and of fungus filled stairs, leaving Zach staring after them with the car keys in his hands.

"I'll drive," Cam said, comfortingly nodding to Zach, who handed her the car keys with an outstretched arm, as if he wanted to get rid of them immediately and the bunch of keys would bite if he held them a second longer.

She slipped the keys in her pocket and shook her head laughing as she continued to take pictures.

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"I still don't understand why you really wanted to drive home first," Tempe said on her usual secure tone. "I mean, I have seen you naked before," she stated coolly, not giving him the chance to interject. "Bones, I really don't want to be reminded of the time you suddenly entered my bathroom."

"You have nothing to be ashamed of," she said, gazing at him as if she was just talking about the weather, her voice not giving anything more away than the meaning of the words she pronounced. Booth swallowed, not saying anything at all and then focusing on the road before him for the rest of the ride.

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Booth drove his dark department Chevrolet into the little parking lot, right beside a familiar FBI vehicle, pushing in the clutch and the brake, then shutting the car's engine down, removing its key from the ignition and pulling up the hand brake. He and his partner exited the Chevrolet and walked over to the manager of the golf course, who was motioning for them and presented himself as Michael Burrows, shaking their respective hands, Tempe's a little longer than necessary.

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Burrows walked them to the side of the golf course, without saying a word. Suddenly, he just stood still.

"And where are the remains?" Tempe asked, sharply, her grayish blue eyes thoroughly scanning the environment quickly and not noticing anything in particular, right at the moment Booth's eyes found what they had been called for.

"Bones," he whispered, getting her full attention, "Look up," then motioned above with his one index finger.

Her glance trailed up the trunk of the nearest Quercus Rubra, or Northern Red Oak, and rested on the remains of a human being in the top, between the upper branches and half hidden by the dark green oblong-ovate leafs.

"I guess we’re going to need a ladder," Booth mused, just as one of the first responding FBI agents leaned a silver colored metal double extension one against the bole of the one hundred thirty-five feet tall piece of nature, and checked whether it was steady enough to climb. "Alright."

Dr. Brennan pulled her gloves out of her dark blue overall pocket, allowed her bag to slide down her shoulder and onto the thick layer of humus, before moving over to the ladder and putting her right foot on the first beam. Booth hurried over to hold the ladder at the bottom as she climbed it.

The ladder, however, just wasn't long enough for her to reach by the remains. Instead of climbing down again to slant the ladder more steeply or using a longer one, she placed both hands on the lower branches and pushed her weight up to sit on them. She still couldn't reach by the remains and there was only one option left. Climbing. Higher.

"Bones!" Booth yelled, his two feet safely on the earth.

Temperance repeated the same move twice, until she was sitting on almost the highest branch and could easily reach by the remains. "Pubis indicates... male," she yelled, "Approximately thirty-eight to forty-four years old." Tempe shifted on her branch. "And according to what I'm seeing here, I would guess the remains have been up here for at least two years."

"Bones, I think you should come down now," Booth yelled.

"I have a wonderful view up here," Tempe replied, just loud enough for her partner to hear.

"Bones–" "Alright, I'm on my way down..."

"Careful," Booth warned, as her right foot slid out and she landed on the lower branch hard, barely catching herself by grasping the nearest limbs tightly with her hands. Booth quickly climbed up the ladder himself to help his partner. He felt it would be too ironic if, after surviving so many violent situations, she lost her life trying to get out of a tree.

Booth gradually climbed down the ladder again as she neared it. When he reached the layer of humus again safely, and she was halfway down the ladder, he stretched out both arms to catch her. She allowed him to grab her under the armpits and lift her down. "Thank you," she said, as Booth began to pluck the dark green colored leafs out of her brown hair with an expression of disgust on his face.

"There's only one logical explanation for the mystery of how he ended up there that high," Tempe said, first looking up to the man in the leafs, before looking straight at her FBI partner with her magnificent light eyes.

"Airplane," Booth concluded. "But, it could have happened illogically as well... Like, he could have been playing golf, and accidentally hit the ball in this tree. Then, the guy went searching for it, and noticed it up there. So, he climbed up into that piece of wood, slipped out like you just did, and wasn't as lucky as you were."

Tempe nodded, thoughtfully. "But, if your theory is consistent with what happened–" "Bones, there are even more possible theories about how that guy ended up in that tree. The murderer could have placed him there, sure no one would find the body there. And, if he has really been lying there that long, two years, like you just said..." "I'm absolutely–" "Bones. If he has really been lying there that long, then the murderer was right. If there was one at least."

Temperance nodded. "Who has found the remains?" she asked, instantly turning her full attention to the golf course assistant, who seemed to be shocked anyone asked him a question and made a little jump of fear.

"Julia and Evan Hemmanderb," Burrows said, indicating the old and gray couple behind him with a thumb. "Two of our oldest clients," he added, as Tempe and Booth both reached beside him to look at the couple on the white painted wooden bench, each holding a cup of hot coffee to calm down from their malign discovery. "The couple was practicing on the golf course, when Julia hit the ball a little too hard and in the wrong direction. She and her husband went to search it, but found a corpse instead."

Now, if you were looking for a little white ball, and found the skull of what had once been a real human being, wouldn't you... be a bit alarmed? The skull had probably been blown away by the cool wind, without being found, for the trees weren't exactly part of the golf course...

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"Beth Winston and Matthew Harmon," Tempe said, reading the names on the screen, which had been found by Angela's drawings. The drawings exactly matched the photos of the flyers, which had been all over town since their disappearance. "Respectively sixteen and fourteen years old."

"Both missing since the morning of August 29th," Booth added from behind her, reading the whole thing as Angela scrolled down the page. Tempe looked up at him. "The date is consistent with my findings," she said, causing Booth to sigh at her words. Another couple of parents to inform of their respective children's death.

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Tempe chewed her bottom lip and tried not to make it too obvious that she was shaking all over. Booth noticed, however, and subtly laid his hand on top of hers. She didn't have any idea why this was so hard for her; she had been through hundreds of these situations already. Still, it felt really awkward, the anthropologist had to admit.

In the beginning, it had been far worse. True. The only relationships she had had in those days, had been with dead people. That made it much harder to deal with situations like that, in which people were being told their loved ones were found dead, and most probably murdered. And then, if turned out that one of the bereaved had something to do with it, she– It always made her think about her own past.

"I'm sorry," Booth said, softly, "Do you recognize the girl on this picture?"

The FBI agent produced a picture from his inside pocket and showed it to the crying woman, who was being held together by her husband, who sat right beside her on the nineteenth century chaise longue. Mrs. Harmon took the old picture from Booth with a shaking hand, and looked at it with narrowing eyes. "That's Beth," she concluded. "Beth Winston."

Booth looked up at his partner briefly before turning his attention back to the Harmons. "She was found together with Matthew. Do you have any idea why?"

"He and Beth were a couple since a few months before he vanished," Mr. Harmon spoke up; it was the first thing he said since the two people had walked into the living room. Unlike Mrs. Harmon, Joe's voice sounded rather normal.

Suddenly, the four adults heard a soft cry, which was followed by a shaky inhalation, causing them to look up towards the sound, and then soft footfalls on the stairs. The partners first gazed at each other, before turning their attention back to the parents. "That's our daughter," Mrs. Harmon explained. "Hayley. She–" She collapsed in another fit of sobs.

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The thirteen-year-old girl had heard every single word. Her brother had been found. Dead. The word just kept pounding in her head, even now she was lying on her abdomen on her neo Gothic four-poster bed. A soft knock on her door made her look up and wipe the tears away with the back of her left hand. The bedroom door was gently opened.

"Can I come in?" Tempe asked.

Hayley nodded and pushed herself up with both hands, swinging her feet over the edge of her bed, sitting upright with her toes barely touching the parquet.

The anthropologist opened the door further, slipping through the gap and closing the door behind her. She walked over to the four-poster and sat down beside the young girl. Tempe had never had such things and was pretty sure that double bed cost more than her whole bedroom at her grandfather's had at the time, but she was still very grateful that he had rescued her from the life of a foster child. No day went by without her being thankful for that. The chance she would have been with one family for any longer than a month, had been as big as the chance of hitting a fly unconscious with a swing of a hammer. Having children had turned out to be different from what the couples had imagined, and it was just easier to…

"Sometimes, it was quite hard to live with the fact I was only Matthew's little sister, but I never wanted this to happen," the young girl whispered, her words hard to make out because of the lump in her throat.

And Tempe thought about what it had been like for her. Because she had been the little sister of Russ Brennan, the most popular guy of the whole school. So she thought she understood exactly what the girl meant. Sometimes, it was just annoying that you were always considered the kid sister, but at the same time, you were really proud of who you were.

The anthropologist tried to recall what she had read about Hayley in the case file. She thought hard. And then a bright light went on in her head. Last year, the thirteen-year-old girl had been at a psychiatric facility for a few months. She had tried to kill a fellow student, because the boy had jokingly called her a bitch. That's what the report said at least, although Tempe herself doubted the boy had meant it jokingly. Kids of that age could be incredibly cruel to each other.

Back in the black department Chevrolet, Booth and Tempe filled each other in on what had been said in the living room and Hayley's bedroom.

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After their visit to the Harmon family, Booth drove them back to the lab, where Zach wanted a second opinion on the body of the tree-guy. "Dr. Brennan!" Dr. Addy exclaimed, as she walked up to the platform where the rest of her team was working.

Based on the piece of metal in the guy's ankle, he and Hodgins had already concluded the guy had had an ankle operation in the past, but… "Is there a serial number?" Tempe asked. "Not that I have noticed," sounded the reply.

"That means it must have happened before those were introduced in medical surgery, or... the doctor operating wasn't following–" "I haven't found anything in the medical records of any hospitals in the area," Hodgins interrupted.

"Then our guy might have had it somewhere abroad, where the doctors aren't all that strict with protocol," Temperance concluded.

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"Do you think she has something to do with her brother's death?" Tempe asked, the next morning when she got into Booth's assigned department vehicle, which would take them to inform Beth's parents of the recent happenings with the case.

"She told you that she never wanted this to happen. That's an interesting word choice, don't you think so too? Maybe it just became too much for her, never being seen as someone real herself, but always being treated as Matthew's little sister? And–"

The soft beeping sound of a Blackberry filled the department vehicle. Temperance reached for the PDA immediately, pushed the button to accept the call and held it by her ear, hearing Zach's voice once again.

*Dr. Brennan?* Although Dr. Addy did recognize the doctor's voice through the receiver, he usually announced himself like that. To make sure it really was her talking. In high school, Zach had once made a mistake this way, and had accidentally told the wrong girl…

This was the main reason why Temperance knew instantly who was on the other end. She never really looked at the caller ID.

"Zach."

Booth navigated his department vehicle around a right turn and turned the orange indicator off, his ears subtly focusing on his partner's words, while driving them to a side street off Maine Avenue, where Beth Winston had once lived. The sides of the road were fenced off with big trees that caught the sunlight, drawing dark shapes on the concrete.

*We have found some kind of bullet in the girl's right scapula,* Dr. Addy's voice sounded. *According to the size and the place, this was likely what killed her.*

"Wait," Tempe said, "What do you mean about–" *We are not really sure whether this is a bullet,* he said, frustrated, because it was the first time in his career he had to admit he wasn't really sure about something. He planned to make sure it would be the last time as well.

Tempe thought for a moment, before saying, "Send it to the FBI's Ballistics department, and see what their experts can come up with." Booth was still listening very attentively, as he pushed on the brake for a red light.

Zach nodded, before realizing she couldn't see it on the other end. *Alright.*

"Anything about the remains of the boy?" Tempe asked.

*His ribcage was completely crushed. Something or someone heavy must have put pressure on his upper body for a very long time, resulting in a rupture of one of the serous membranes lining the thorax and covering the lungs, allowing blood to spill into the pleural space and equalizing the pressure between it and the lungs, causing a hemothorax and eventually death,* Zach said, a bomb of information coming from his mouth.

Tempe first considered the picture of Matthew and Beth, then thought about their respective ages and the position in which the young teenagers had been found. There was a strong possibility that, if the girl had been shot, she had toppled over by the impact. And what if she had accidentally ended up on her boyfriend? She had been two years older than he, measuring five feet six inches and weighing about a hundred sixty-five pounds, according to the picture and medical records...

Who had shot her, though? If the piece of metal the other squints had retrieved was a bullet after all...

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The FBI department vehicle came to a halt in the driveway of a falling-down house that put the word 'hovel' to shame. The white paint of the low fence was partially flaked off and an old bronze colored bucket served as a mailbox. Booth's eyes wandered to his partner's for a few seconds. She undid her seat belt and he followed her example, leaving the car and shutting its door tightly.

The two of them walked over the garden path, which was almost entirely covered with weeds and was bordered with some kind of yellow flowers whose name he didn't know. When he and the anthropologist ended up at the front door, whose green paint looked as old as the formerly white fence's, he glanced at his partner briefly. This couldn't be true. This had to be the wrong address.

It didn't have to be said that the size of the differences between rich and poor were perfectly unnatural. How big the differences between the Harmons and the family Winston were. To Booth, it felt more like a typical romance thing, what he would call a true cliché.

The Harmon family lived at a wealthy mansion in one of the most prominent neighborhoods of Washington D.C., and then the Winstons lived… there was no nice word for the place where this family lived.

Tempe's eyes searched the front door but didn't notice a bell or knocker. She decided to knock on the door itself, producing a hollow sound and pulling Booth out of his thoughts. She had a pretty good idea what he was thinking about right at this moment.

Both of them heard a key turning in the lock and gazed at the door expectantly. The front door was pushed ajar, showing a petite woman with greasy curly hair and purple bags under her twinkling brown eyes. She had once been a beautiful woman. The toddler boy on her hip was pulling on her long hair with his little fists and she grimaced, while another toddler boy appeared by her side and a little dog wriggled between her spread legs and started yapping at Booth with his sharp teeth exposed.

"Mrs. Winston?" he asked, as Tempe spontaneously squatted and caressed the little Jack Russell behind his big ears. The dog immediately stopped barking and rolled on his back, his long pink tongue out of his muzzle, his tail sweeping everywhere and his hind leg tapping on the cobblestones in delight. This got a chuckle from the anthropologist and the toddlers.

Her partner looked at her briefly before turning his gaze back to the woman, who nodded slightly and opened the door further, inviting them into her house. Tempe stood up, and followed the FBI agent into the home, the Jack Russell slipping through the opening as well, before Mrs. Winston closed the door behind them.

They entered a surprisingly large living room, as Mrs. Winston slid past them and put the boy, whom the two of them assumed was her son, down onto the floor, where another boy and girl sat, playing with some building blocks. They heard the soft patter of little feet as their brother, who had appeared in the doorway earlier, followed his mother into the living room. She hurried over to the couch, quickly picking up the laundry basket which was in there. "Sit down," she said, before disappearing into the adjoining room.

The two of them sat down onto the couch, as Mrs. Winston entered the large living room again. "I'm sorry," she excused, "Having five children makes things a little too interesting..."

Booth nodded, assuring her it was all right, just as the front door closed and heavy footfalls sounded.

"My husband," the woman explained to them softly. Neither Booth nor Tempe missed the nervous tic in her face and the movement of her hand to her belly. Mrs. Winston looked towards her children with a faint smile, just as a man entered the room. His little black beetle eyes almost disappeared in his fleshy head and he smelled of alcohol: whiskey to be specific.

Tempe also noticed the four children in the room pausing in what they were doing for a brief second.

Even the dog of the family fell silent and lay down beside the couch, with his ugly head hidden between his forelegs and his brown ears hanging over them, as if he had done something wrong and wanted to shield himself from the harm which was going to be done to him.

"Gosh, HONEY, are we having a party?" he asked. The smile that appeared on his face was nothing less than creepy.

Mrs. Winston looked at her husband in fear. She just hoped he wouldn't do what she already knew would be coming next. The youngest boy started crying, as he walked towards his wife, grabbing her wrists and pulling her flush against him. "I asked you a question," he said in a soft, menacing tone. "Who are these people?" the man screamed drunkenly, losing his temper as no answer was heard.

The woman's lips quivered in pure fear of her own husband, as Tempe noticed her rounded belly, which explained what she had seen in her gait and which had been covered by her large sweater previously.

"She's pregnant," Tempe whispered to her partner, as he stood up to rescue the woman out of the grasp of her obviously abusive husband. His gut told him it wasn't the first time he had acted this way. "You really figured that out just from the way she's walking?" Booth said between gritted teeth.

"Yes," Tempe answered, "You can see her pelvic bone is moving apart to make room for the baby in the future stages of the pregnancy. Although her swollen abdomen makes it very obvious as well."

Mr. Winston pushed his wife against the mantelpiece, making her whimper weakly. The noise of pain that came from her mouth as she tried to shield herself from the abuse, told the whole room he had hurt her. As Booth neared him, he turned around to hit the FBI agent hard in the face, loosening his grip on his wife, then spitting in Booth's face and turning back toward his wife. "You're going to get what's coming to you later, bitch," he threatened, stomping back out of the room. The three adults heard his footsteps on the stairs, then disappearing. Tempe turned towards her partner, softly touching his injured cheek and taking her handkerchief to wipe the spit off and to dab the gash.

"He's going to sleep it off," Mrs. Winston said, as her knees couldn't carry her weight anymore and she sank down on the carpet.

Tempe's eyes drilled into her partner's, before averting her gaze and turning her attention towards the pregnant woman. "Hold this," she said, meaning the once white handkerchief, which was now mostly red with blood. Booth put pressure on the wound himself, where Mr. Winston's wedding ring had grazed his skin, as Tempe squatted down beside the woman.

"Are you alright?" she asked, getting a little nod from Mrs. Winston. The anthropologist helped her upright again and led her to the couch. "Have you considered going to a battered women's shelter?"

Mrs. Winston's eyes showed even more shock through her tears. "No, no," she said. "He's a very kind man if he's not drunk." Her attitude was typical for women who were abused by their husband, who often tried to protect them like that. 'If he's not drunk.' Both Brennan and Booth doubted this ever occurred, and neither of them missed her subtly reaching out to cover a purple colored bruise on her forearm with her other hand. "And... My children– I can't–" "I think that would be the best solution for you and your children, including the one you are carrying," Booth spoke up, now able to see the bump that Brennan had mentioned.

First, Mrs. Winston's eyes looked at the anthropologist in shock. "How–?" And then she remembered that she was already in her eighteenth week of the forty, nearly halfway through her pregnancy. Since it was her sixth child, her belly had expanded fast and was therefore quite visible.

"How far along are you?" Tempe asked.

She looked into the other woman's light eyes. "About four months," she said, unconsciously looking down at her abdomen and running little circles over it with a soft hand.

"Is your husband aware of that?" Tempe asked, already realizing what the answer was going to be.

"No," Mrs. Winston said, her dark brown eyes widening at first and then narrowing to prevent more tears from finding their way out. She ducked her head in shame. "It isn't his." She looked up at the two people again. "We couldn't even afford a fifth child, and..." Her sentence trailed off into nothing. "I went- dancing in a kind of an- adult- club after the birth of our youngest," Mrs. Winston started again, looking at her children nervously, trying to make sure Dr. Brennan and Agent Booth understood what she meant without saying it directly. "To get everything paid. I earned double if I- gave the customers some- extra entertainment as well. I often received a tip, if I… I needed the money badly, and I did whatever they asked me to do."

Booth and Tempe looked at each other for a brief second. The female swallowed. It must have been hard for her, having to care for five children and working full time.

"And then I lost my job last month... John was so angry when… Beth worked at the bowling alley part time, to help us pay the bills. She wanted to give up school and work full time, but I wanted her to finish her school first, and get her diploma. I never wanted this for my children. I never wanted them to end up like me, running away from home at the age of sixteen, because we just didn't have a penny to spend and I blamed my parents for being poor."

"When was the last time you saw your daughter Beth?" the man finally spoke up, after a few minutes of awkward silence, joining the two women on the couch and removing the handkerchief from his throbbing cheek.

Mrs. Winston was a very smart person and immediately asked, "You have found my daughter. Is she–?"

Booth nodded. "I'm sorry for your loss."

Tempe looked at him with wide eyes. It wasn't the right time to tell a mother something like that. Then again she realized that the right time would never come...

The little girl pulled on her mother's skirt, begging to be picked up. Mrs. Winston looked down at her daughter and lent forward to pick her up. Tempe didn't think she was any older than the age of six. As the woman put her daughter on her lap, she winced in pain and reached out for her belly with both hands. A red stain slowly spread across the couch and onto the floor. Tempe quickly took the little girl and turned to Booth, who sat on her other side. "Call 911."

Mrs. Winston was losing her baby.

"No, wait!" Tempe exclaimed. "It would take too long for them to get here. She needs a hospital NOW." She looked straight at her partner, before saying, "You drive."

"What?" Booth uttered. "Not–" "There's no other option."

"And who is going to keep an eye on the children? I'm not sure whether you noticed, but there are four of them, Bones. Do you want me to take them along?"

"Fine. I drive!" Tempe suggested, although it actually didn't really sound like a suggestion, but more like a threat. And in Booth's eyes, Temperance behind the wheel of his pretty black department vehicle, was most definitely a threat...

His chocolate brown eyes enlarged at the very thought. She couldn't be serious. He would do anything to prevent this from happening, including driving a four-month-pregnant woman with premature contractions to the Emergency Room in his assigned FBI car.

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"Zach! You got anything from the guy in the tree yet?" Tempe was talking incredibly fast, and had started talking as soon as her former assistant had picked up the phone and the ringing had stopped, meaning the call had gone through.

She was sitting in the back of the black Chevrolet, her gaze blinking between the woman in pain beside her and her partner in the front seat behind the wheel, whose eyes she could see clearly through the rear mirror, like they were players in a tennis match.

Thank God the neighbor woman had come in through the back door not long after Mrs. Winston had collapsed in pain. She had wanted to ask for a cup of milk, but had found her neighbor in an uncomfortable position on the bloody couch, both hands pressing against her lower abdomen and two people she didn't know fighting for the car keys of the black FBI Chevrolet in the driveway.

She had agreed to take care of the children, while the pair brought Mrs. Winston to the hospital in a hurry.

They had forgotten about one thing… or: one person. "Mr. Winston," Tempe said out aloud as the vehicle rushed over the busy road and navigated through the other cars, not even a second after she had finished her question. She would rather not think about what happened if he woke up from the commotion and found his wife gone and the neighbor watching his daughter and three sons...

*Sorry?* Zach's voice sounded through the receiver of Tempe's cell phone.

"I'll call for child service," Booth decided, immediately pushing some specific buttons on the contact gear of the Chevrolet. Child services could keep the four children safe, until Mrs. Winston got out of the hospital. Booth really hoped she would realize sooner or later that leaving her husband was the best for her children and her. Although unintentionally, Mr. Winston had already nearly killed an innocent human being. And Booth was afraid it would escalate and he would end the life of someone else, consciously, in that supposedly 'stressed' or drunk state of his.

"I wasn't– What did you come up with?"

The anthropologist heard someone inhaling deeply on the other end, indicating that a bomb of information was going to explode in mere seconds. And she wasn't disappointed.

*There is a serious tibia fracture on the right and left tibia, which fits with a fall of approximately 12,000 feet in height. Hodgins has found a few small pieces of a parachute–* *I have found two different sorts of parachute fabric, one black and the other dark red. They can't be from the same one, because the density of the fabrics is different. This indicates two different parachutes,* Hodgins' voice spoke. He sounded a little more excited than usual.

'If the word 'conspiracy' could be connected with this case...' Tempe thought, thinking there was only one reason for Hodgins to sound so excited. She, however, didn't have any idea that Angela had just given the squint a kiss on the lips, as some kind of a reward for figuring out the clue about the parachutes...

"This makes sense," Tempe said. "There must have been a reserve parachute as well."

Zach nodded on the other side, taking possession of the phone again and continuing, *The color of the parachutes isn't really consistent with Army equipment. Those are khaki. So we have to find another explanation. Maybe Angela's sketch of the skull can help if she's finished.*

"Alright," Tempe said. "Call me if anything comes up."

And he did call her...

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"The baby's still with us," Dr. Genya said, lightly nodding her head to confirm her statement. "You have been incredibly lucky," she added, before disappearing through the door and letting the two people who had brought her in into the room. Tempe and Booth entered the room and saw Mrs. Winston's sad brown eyes staring through the window.

Since both cases were stalled without any information about the bullet-like object or the origin of the parachutes, the two of them had stayed there since their arrival in the hospital, roughly an hour earlier.

Hearing two pair of footfalls onto the white, shining and sterile hospital floor, Lynn Heather Winston turned her gaze to their owners, her chocolate brown eyes piercing them through a haze of tears. She had been forced to deal with the alcohol addiction of her husband in the presence of two state people, had been told her oldest daughter was gone for good and had nearly lost the fetus in her womb, leaving her four children between three and eleven years old at home for its rescue. His rescue. She had been told it was her fourth son.

"Thank you for driving me to the hospital," Mrs. Winston said, both her hands running over her lower abdomen under the white sheets. Although this sixth child wasn't expected, it wasn't any less welcome for her.

"You have multiple fractures," Tempe stated. "Your husband has been abusing you for at least six years," she said, softly.

"My husband works full time as well," the pregnant woman in the hospital bed said. "There is so much stress at his job lately. And I understand that this sometimes gets him a little angry. I understand."

Booth looked at his partner for a second. Mrs. Winston just kept protecting the man that hurt her.

Then, something started vibrating in the pocket of Tempe's dark blue leather jacket. She didn't have to think for a second to find its source and zipped her pocket open, immediately producing her BlackBerry. She had disabled the sound when the three of them had arrived at the hospital and had put it on _vibrate_ instead.

*Zach Addy,* an excited voice spoke as she pushed in a little button and put the phone by her ear.

"Hi, Zach. What have you come up with?"

*We have been running Angela's sketch of the skull through the database and found a match. Neville Evan Gordon. Forty. He has been missing since December 2006... and was last seen at the company Parafly, a company that specializes in skydiving and parachuting.*

"Then that's where Booth and I will be," Tempe said.

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A few minutes after Dr. Addy's call, the partners were on their way to Parafly.

"What do you think about all of this?" Tempe asked, wanting his opinion on both of the cases. She had been supporting her chin with her hand and looking through the car window at the gliding forms of houses and trees, before she looked up at the FBI agent.

"I think we are stuck with the Winston-Harmon case," Booth honestly admitted, his chocolate brown eyes focused on the road before him, while his partner let out a deep sigh, leaned into her hand again and continued staring at the sliding shapes on the other side of the window.

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Cam and the squints were sitting at the bar of Wong Fu's, dispatching their delicious lunch. It was the first time Cam had lunched there; she had finally been persuaded. And she had to admit, the squints hadn't been lying. It was just... delicious.

"Do you think the FBI Ballistics department can figure out what that gold colored metal piece is?" Hodgins asked, stealing another sandwich from Angela, who had her own opinion about the object, "It really looked like a mushroom."

"I'm pretty sure it was a bullet," Cam spoke up, swallowing and picking up her glass of coke to take a sip, before putting it down on the bar again. "A mushroomed one," she added, with a nod and little smile to Angela, who only had eyes for Hodgins.

Zach, who sat in between Cam and Angela, was used to this by now and just continued eating his lunch.

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"Quinn Conlin?" Booth asked, yelling above the rumbling of a helicopter that was ready to take off. The woman in dark blue trouser suit turned around and tried her best to keep her long black hair out of her face. She was standing on the platform, where the helicopter was ready to take off. "Yes?"

The helicopter climbed into the cloudy evening air, and the rumbling noises of the engine and the white horizontal rotors gradually decreased, so they could understand each other without yelling.

"We wanted to talk to you about Neville Gordon," Tempe spoke up.

"What about him?"

"In 2006, Neville disappeared during his parachute flight."

"That's correct," Mrs. Conlin replied, as if she couldn't care less. There was something strange about the woman, Booth thought. Although he couldn't quite put his finger on what exactly it might be, there was something strange about her. The End.

"We would like to ask you some questions about the specific day that he disappeared," the FBI agent said.

"Fine. Then I suggest we continue this conversation in my office."

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"I already answered all of these questions two years ago," Conlin said, impatiently. She was sitting behind her wooden desk, facing the two people who had presented themselves as Agent Booth and Dr. Brennan. The Parafly head looked a little nervous, but seemed comfortable in the presence of the two state people.

"His remains were found on a golf course, about thirty miles south from Parafly."

Nothing changed in the woman's expression. She must have known him well, because he had been one of her skydiving and parachuting instructors, but she really didn't show any kind of emotion. This was... weird.

Was the lack of reaction delayed shock? Maybe she had kept hope alive for his reappearance...

"What does this have to do with me?"

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It had eventually taken the two partners more than half an hour to get some useful information out of Quinn Conlin. Thank God she had a very important appointment, or they would have still been sitting there.

So, Neville had had his permit for skydiving and parachuting – in fact, he was an experienced instructor. On the day he had disappeared, the parachute expert had been wanting to try something new up there in the sky. His experiment could have gone wrong and he could have been… Could it have been an accident?

It all seemed to fit too perfectly.

Booth just couldn't let go of the fact there was something about this Quinn Conlin. Something strange, and he wanted to figure out what precisely. So, on their way down the stairs, the FBI agent took out his cell phone and pushed only one button. "John, can you do me a favor?"

*Sure, Boothy.* 'Boothy' had been his nickname in the Army.

"Can you check the head of Parafly completely out for me?"

*Sure. Name?*

"Quinn Conlin," Booth said through the receiver and noticed Tempe rolling her grayish blue eyes and sighing. Oh, whenever he had a gut feeling... She did have to admit his gut had always been right thus far, though.

*Alright. I'll call you if anything comes up."

"Thank you. John, work your computerized magic."

The Parafly building was a huge grid of hallways and could be best described as a maze. That's why Tempe and Booth ended up in the storage places, where a young guy with a crystal blue overall was stocking some big boxes.

"I'm sorry," Tempe spoke, causing the guy to turn around and show his handsome, youthful face. He topped his matching crystal blue cap and wiped the sweat off with the back of his other hand.

"Can I help you?" he asked, friendly. "I'm Nicholas Burns, one of the two instructors."

Booth gazed at him with a very weird expression. Why would someone who is an instructor be stocking boxes containing who-knows-what?

"These boxes have just been delivered. One of our regular stockers is dealing with a personal matter at the moment, and the other became ill this morning. Fred Hollings, our new other instructor, is out and about with an Italian couple that wanted to skydive for their honeymoon here, and Ms. Conlin wanted it to be stocked today, so it was left to me."

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"Dr. Brennan, I just heard from Ballistics," Zach said, as she slid her entrance pass through the reader to prevent the alarm from going off, and walked up to the three autopsy tables on the work platform and immediately reached for her dark blue lab coat on the peg. As usual, she was accompanied by Booth. "I was just about to call you."

"What did the experts come up with?" Tempe asked, to the present people in general.

"It was indeed a bullet," Cam answered. "A Death Talon."

"They don't sell those anymore," Booth spoke. "They haven't been sold commercially since '96 or '97." He had been a professional sniper at the Army and knew a fair amount about guns, and especially about heavy calibers. And Death Talons? He was a little too familiar with them. His abdomen had once been grazed by one in battle. Death Talons were often used by thugs and most definitely heavy equipment.

"Maybe they were kept for a... special occasion," Cam stated. "In that case, the killer must have a past as a thug himself, or have very good connections. Death Talons aren't anything to mess around with..."

"Ballistics concluded the bullet was likely shot by a Tec-9," Zach added, when no one seemed to think that little detail was important enough to share with the partners.

"Hard core," Angela said. She wasn't too familiar with guns, but had heard a lot about those blow-back-operated semi-automatic firearms. Not to mention her best friend had simply bought a giant revolver at the mall. She just loved living in the U.S.

Because of the lack of soil samples, the bug and slime guy joined the conversation. "Personally, I actually think a firearm would fit better in the hands of someone of distinction. Despite the fact most of these don't have any idea how to pull the trigger and, the criminals will always be the ones handling the guns..."

"You might have just cracked the case," Booth exclaimed, grabbing his partner by her wrist and starting to pull her in the direction of the parking.

This was the second time Booth did that, and it was getting on Tempe's nerves. She wriggled herself out of his grasp and gave him an annoyed glance, before undoing her mid-length lab coat, giving her partner the chance to explain himself in the process.

"Would you want your well-brought-up son dating a girl of low descent?"

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"He told us she was the one," Mr. Harmon spat. "He told us he wanted to become old with her. That he truly loved her, despite her different descent. That he wanted to make her happy and knew he could."

Booth was sitting on the opposite of the table in the interrogation room, while Tempe observed them through a layer of glass as usual. His disgust for the man that was facing him only thickened by the second.

"My son was only fourteen years old and didn't know anything about love, although he thought he did. He was too naive and believed he could change the world by himself. And then I overheard their conversation. He was planning to run away with her and hide from us. She had brainwashed him that way; she had him twisted around her little finger. I would rather not have a son than have one who chummed up with gypsies."

"And you got what you wanted," Booth bit off, before standing up from his chair and making his way to the door, the anger readable in his chocolate brown eyes.

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He had barely opened his mouth, when the all-too-familiar sound of his cell phone filled the observation room, where Tempe had been observing him with crossed arms. It was John, Booth noticed, right before accepting the call by pushing the button, and holding the phone by his ear.

"John."

*There's not much information about Parafly and Quinn Conlin, but I discovered she was married to your victim at the time of the murder. The couple didn't have children, because both wanted to concentrate on their careers in the skydiving and parachuting business. She as the head of the company Parafly, and he as a well known instructor.*

"Thank you," Booth only said through the receiver, before saying to his partner, "I guess we should pay Mrs. Gordon another visit… or Ms. Conlin, as she obviously prefers."

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"Ms. Conlin, why didn't you tell us you were married to Neville Gordon?" Booth asked.

He, Tempe and Mrs. Gordon/Ms. Conlin were sitting in her office. Her mouth opened, but no sound escaped her lips. She had thrown a bunch of money at the government to annul the marriage and let all official documents expire. How had they known about her marriage? Her expression showed true surprise at the unexpected question.

"FBI," Booth explained, with only three syllables.

"Mr. Gordon wanted to try something new up in the sky, but he at least knew how to open a parachute, right? He was one of your instructors. So, there's only one logical explanation. A defect with both his parachutes."

"The parachutes are kept behind electronic security in the basements. You only get in there with an electronic entrance pass. And there are two hidden cameras, which transfer images directly to this computer," the older woman said, lightly nodding to the quad-core computer on her excessively neat desk.

"Who has access to them?" Booth asked. "I mean, who owns such electronic entrance pass?" Tempe gradually understood her partner's tactic, and let him work his magic on Ms. Conlin, who sighed deeply before answering, "All instructors."

"And you?" Booth wondered.

"Of course," the head of Parafly answered, showing her too white teeth as she smiled widely. "Why wouldn't I have an electronic entrance pass to the basement of my own company?"

Tempe's FBI partner thought the conversation was going a little too smoothly. As if she had rehearsed the answers by heart. He didn't say a word, but took his cell phone out and searched a specific number. When Booth had eventually found it, he pushed a button and held the mobile by his ear. He didn't have much with computers, but enough to realize most kind of electronic devices were regulated with them. "John?"

A long and deep sigh was audible on the other side. *Booth.* And where had the nickname 'Boothy' suddenly gone? *What do you need?*

"Can you do me another favor?"

*Just tell me what you need."

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"I'm going to need all of these electronic entrance passes," Booth said, ending the phone call.

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"Three passes were logged on that particular day," John 'J.' Gallagher said with excitement, as he walked into Booth's office, where Tempe and her partner had been exchanging thoughts about their current case. Both of them were convinced that this one wasn't going to get solved as easily as the other one had been.

Mrs. Winston still hadn't been informed that her daughter's murder case had been solved. Both of them realized it had to happen sooner or later, and knew that delaying it didn't make it easier either. So they had decided to go to the hospital after shift to inform her about it all. The tone in which you say something can really change the impact it has, although the meaning of your words is still the same...

J. handed his old Army friend a single page with information and disappeared out of the office. Booth's eyes slid over the document briefly. There were only three names on it. Tempe had been sitting on the edge of her partner's bureau and slid off it to look over his shoulder and inspect the document for herself. Three names, with their respective times of use: Neville Gordon, Nicholas Burns, and... Quinn Conlin.

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"I would have never hurt him! I loved Neville!" Burns finally screamed, after an hour and a half of interrogation. Booth unconsciously blinked at his partner at the other side of the glass layer, although he actually couldn't see her. She could see him, though. It was one-way glass, used almost exclusively for interrogation rooms. So that people can look at their colleagues and the suspect or suspects and observe them closely, without them noticing anything.

"You two had a relationship?" Booth asked, turning his attention back to his suspect.

"Kind of."

"And what do you mean by that?" Booth asked, having expected a yes or no instead of the answer he got: 'Kind of.'. What was that supposed to mean? Tempe shifted her weight to her other leg on the other side of the one-way glass.

"We were in love with each other, but couldn't quite act like true lovers. Most things true lovers do, were just impossible for us. Neville was married," the young instructor said.

"To your boss." The boy nodded his head lightly. "His wife didn't–" "No!" Nicholas exclaimed, violently shaking his head. "Although Neville was quite sure she did it with one of our stockers and had had sex with other colleagues." Booth gave it some time to assimilate. The young instructor suddenly seemed incredibly tired, fear showing through his eyes, and looked much older than he actually was.

"You two had a sexual relationship as well?"

"What does this have to do with it?" Booth didn't answer. "Well, yes. We often hid ourselves in the parachute storage room. And if Ms. Conlin wasn't present, which actually happened sometimes, we ran off to her office upstairs to make love there. We both thought it was kind of exciting."

"Did you two–" Booth subtly swallowed his next words. "That one particular day in August?"

The instructor nodded and the FBI agent saw his face lighting up with the memory of the last time he had been with his lover. His pass had been used at 9:05 on that one particular day. In the afternoon, the electronic device had logged another two entries. One by Ms. Conlin at 14:20 in the early afternoon, and the second one at 14:31 by the victim Mr. Gordon. This had been only eleven minutes later. This put her in the storage room, right before her husband left for his jump.

"Ms. Conlin was having an important meeting in her office, with the director of a parachute giant. And there wasn't anything planned for us that morning, so we went our way and disappeared in the basements."

Booth was quite sure the guy wouldn't lie about something like that, and decided to get Conlin in to sound her out.

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About half an hour later, the head of the company Parafly was sitting on the chair opposite Booth.

"Can you explain me why your electronic entrance pass was used only eleven minutes before your husband's on the day he got killed?" Booth asked, his eyes completely blank of emotion.

"I was checking on the parachutes." "Why?" "I was checking how many we still had to use, to make out if I should order–" "I'm pretty sure you had the exact number of parachutes in stock on your computer. And I believe you have staff for that."

Ms. Conlin's mouth opened a few times promising, but no sound escaped her crimson red colored lips.

"Did your important meeting with the parachute giant finish a little earlier than planned? Did you catch your husband with the other instructor, the man you had hired?" Did you–" "What?" "Don't act as if you really had no idea that your husband was secretly having sex with your instructor!" Booth exclaimed.

Ms. Conlin's face turned red in scarcely one minute and she exploded, "I got a phone call from the company, that the director had become ill and couldn't make it to our meeting. We put it off to the week after the initial date. I went looking for my husband, to tell him about it. Like any good wife would do. I found the parachute storage room occupied. I heard him scream like a horny stallion, and I realized why we had stopped having sex."

She swallowed, and then continued even louder, "He was screwing a chick in the basement of the company I inherited from my father and decided to continue with him. I went back upstairs and decided to confront him with it later. Then, I saw him and Burns coming out of the storage room, and I saw them kissing each other. I had lost my husband to a man. I wanted to get back at him, and in my rage, I switched both his parachutes with two defective ones, that looked exactly the same as his."

"I hope it was worth it," Booth spat, breathing heavily and standing up from his chair and making his way out, to join his partner outside the interrogation room where he had spent the last few hours. He realized they had been really lucky that Parafly still used the same security device as in 2006.

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"Bones, are you sure you want to come with me?" Booth asked, as he and his partner both stood in the hallway outside Mrs. Winston's room at the hospital. Tempe just nodded, and followed Booth inside, although she was trembling.

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"You alright?" Booth asked, as he drove his black department vehicle up the drive way of Tempe's apartment. She hadn't said a word since the two of them had left the hospital, about ten minutes earlier. He understood, though.

The anthropologist nodded her head lightly. "Do you want to come in?" she asked.

Booth sighed. He definitely hated to leave her like that, knowing she would feel safer with her partner there with her. Knowing he himself had never been so unconcerned as two nights before. "I'm sorry, Bones," he whispered, causing her to hang her head in disappointment. He reached out with his hand to lift her chin. "I would definitely love to, but I can't. I–" "Alright."

"I'm sorry, Bones," Booth said, stroking her pale cheek softly, meaning every single syllable, watching her undo her seat belt to leave the vehicle and walk up to the front door alone.

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It was already very late and in the Jeffersonian Institute, there was only one light still burning. The light of the 3D-room. Angela put her pencil down on the table and looked at her own drawing in sadness. A soft knock made her look up and look into Hodgins' blue eyes. "You alright?"

"No," Angela said, shaking her head lightly in honesty. She wasn't alright. "I just don't understand how someone can do something like that to his own child." Hodgins walked over to her and wrapped his arms around his love, pulling her flush against his chest and hugging her. She grasped his arms tightly with her small hands, like she wanted him to just hold her forever and never think about letting go. She sank back against his upper body, biting her lower lip and blinking rapidly a few times, struggling not to cry. She was hopelessly trying to control her breath in an effort to fight the tears that stung her eyes.

Hodgins' crystal blue eyes wandered over the drawing she had made, two pair of eyes looking at him. The eyes of an old couple, happily entangled into each other's arms like Angela and he were at the same moment. He couldn't immediately tell who they were, but recognized the resemblance after a minute.

The old couple was sitting on a porch swing. The features of both had grown older with the passing of what looked like at least sixty years. The woman's long blond hair had turned in a light shade of gray, but the twinkle still hadn't left her ocean blue eyes. She was smiling towards her husband, who was holding her hand tightly in his, his own hair turned mostly grey, and even white here and there. The smile he softly returned to his wife showed better than any words could that he still found her the most beautiful woman in the world.

Hodgins briefly remembered the pictures of the flyers, and suddenly recognized the old couple. It was Beth and Matthew, their wish to grow old together granted by Angela, if only on paper.

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Mrs. Winston had been released from the hospital on the day of Mr. Harmon's trial. She had insisted on attending it, since the baby and she were both fine. Dr. Brennan and Booth were sitting next to each other in the courtroom, a row behind the Winstons. Mr. Winston was there as well. He was holding the still pregnant Lynn's hand, and seemed to be sober.

"So..." Judge Ratner spoke. "That rich bastard should–" Booth started, but his partner shushed him. "The defendant has been found guilty by a jury of his peers. The sentence is life, with a minimum of thirty years. Case dismissed!"

"That's justice," Booth agreed, as everyone present in the courtroom stood up and started to make their way out. From a distance, the partners saw Mrs. Harmon burst out in tears. Temperance didn't fail to notice her daughter Hayley disappearing in the crowd of people, trying to wriggle her way out as invisibly as possible. And Tempe understood she just needed to get away from it all.

Looking over the courtroom, the anthropologist caught Mrs. Winston's glance for a brief second. She had surely noticed Hayley as well.

Cam joined her team members outside the courtroom. "What's on your mind?" she asked the younger anthropologist. Dr. Brennan looked up at the question. "What?" "What's on your mind?" Cam repeated. "You seem quite deep in thought."

"Nothing, I just–" Temperance sighed. "Nothing."

She turned her back away from her friends, and just started to walk. Thinking about how the divisions between people could, and would, keep on ruining the world. She didn't look up as her partner's panting popped up beside her, indicating the FBI agent had followed her.

"The world isn't only made up of nice people, Bones," he whispered, as his partner stopped in her tracks. Booth followed her grayish blue eyes and found what she was looking at. Without either of them noticing, they had ended up at the graveyard.

And Tempe now knew where Hayley had gone off to. She was sitting on her knees in front of Beth's grave. She and Matthew had been buried the day before, but not in the same graveyard. Even in death, the differences between rich and poor kept them from each other. Mrs. Winston was there as well, laying a gentle hand on the girl's shoulder and sitting beside her.

It would turn out.

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'What should I order?' Tempe thought. She had spent some time thinking, while the orange Washington sun had faded to a dark shade of red and disappeared, casually leaving a reddish orange shine on the horizon, that invisible line that divides heaven and earth. Or perhaps it lets them touch each other. It depends on the way you look at it, but one thing was undeniable: the fact the shine spreads some kind of warmth as well. Even the least romantic souls have to admit it feels special. And it has its own way of touching us.

Even the anthropologist had to admit that, as her grayish blue eyes reached as far as they could through the layer of glass the French door provided. Temperance's hand clutched the handle and pushed it down, opening the sliding door and stepping into the soft warm breeze, the wind playing with her dark brown hair while her nostrils caught the sweet scent in the late evening air.

She heard the tires of a big vehicle screeching downstairs. "Probably just the neighbors," the woman said to herself, putting a hand to her mouth and trying to suppress a yawn.

She suddenly realized she was cold to the bone, and pulled her arms around herself, refusing to go back inside. She liked it up there. Her stomach repeated the still unanswered question of what to order.

Tempe had just been too tired to cook. And cooking for one wasn't really fun. Her surprise was noticeable as she heard a knock on her apartment door, announcing a late visitor.

She walked over to the source of the sound, and put the door ajar. Booth. And she should have known. He wasn't alone, though. Tempe's eyes widened at the sight before her. Her FBI partner was carrying something in his arms, something soft pink and unmistakable.

Booth was carrying a little pink... pig. Tempe opened the door further, inviting the late visitors in, and closing the door behind them. She walked over to the large sliding window to close it, and then turned her attention back to Booth and his pink accomplice. "Hi, Bones." The pig, however, had its own way of greeting her. With an immense loud grunt. Now she realized where Booth had to go earlier. "We noticed your light was still on," Booth said, looking down at the animal and patting its ass.

"You can't be serious," Tempe exclaimed, as Booth handed her the pig and watched her closely. A little smile tugged at the corners of her lips and soon decorated it beautifully.

"Are you going to call it Jasper?" Booth wondered. She had told him she wanted a pig for pet, and would call it Jasper, but the answer he received wasn't exactly the one he had expected to hear.

"No," his partner simply answered him. "It reminds me quite a bit of you, actually, so I'm going to call it Booth."

"You can't be serious!" Booth exclaimed on his turn. "You're comparing me to a... pig? You just can't be serious!"

"I am," Tempe said, blankly staring at her partner, her gaze suggesting she wouldn't allow protest. The pig, which had just been given its name 'Booth', was being put on the carpet in the living room. "I was just planning to order something to eat."

"Thai food?" Booth suggested, a smile spreading across his face at the thought.

"Sound like a good idea. You call."

O°O°O°O°

Both pigs spent the night at Tempe's. No one really knows what happened between her and the bigger pig that night, though...


End file.
